


the most wonderful time of the year

by starkly



Series: you've been thunderstruck [21]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Bakery, Competition, M/M, Small Towns
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-24
Updated: 2020-12-24
Packaged: 2021-03-11 05:13:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,613
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28279686
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starkly/pseuds/starkly
Summary: Every year the little town in upstate New York where Tony lives holds a baking competition for the winter holidays, and every year for the last five years Tony has won that competition. His bakery, Grateful Bread, has been a popular spot since it opened and he’s thankful for the warm welcome he got when he came to town.And then Bifrost Bakery moves in across the street, and Tony finally has some real competition in the bake off this year.
Relationships: Tony Stark/Thor
Series: you've been thunderstruck [21]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2064666
Comments: 3
Kudos: 28





	the most wonderful time of the year

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written for NaNoWriMo 2020 and [posted here](https://aleator.tumblr.com/post/635921202193530880) on my tumblr writing blog. This fic was proofread before being uploaded here but is otherwise unchanged.
> 
> Prompts taken from the AU-gust 2020 challenge list on Twitter. Day Twenty-One: Professional Rivals AU.

Every year the little town in upstate New York where Tony lives holds a baking competition for the winter holidays, and every year for the last five years Tony has won that competition. It’s probably an unfair advantage--he used to own his own restaurant in New York City, but he’s put that life behind him and nobody in town seems to mind that he keeps winning. His bakery, Grateful Bread, has been a popular spot since it opened and he’s thankful for the warm welcome he got when he came to town.

And then Bifrost Bakery moved in across the street.

Bifrost Bakery was owned by Thor Odinson, a handsome, friendly man who made it very hard to hate him, and his brother Loki, who was pretty much the opposite of Thor in all ways. The day Bifrost Bakery opened its doors, Thor made a point to go to all the other shops on the street and invite them down to Bifrost Bakery for free samples for their grand opening. Tony wanted to be petty and not go, but he figured he should scope out his new competition.

To his distress, Bifrost Bakery was actually good. Thankfully Thor seemed to specialize in cakes and similar desserts while Tony focused more on pastries, so the overlap between their bakeries wasn’t too great. On the other hand, now he had real competition for the holiday bake off.

Two weeks before the competition, Tony is half tempted to try and get Loki to stop Thor from signing up for it. A week before the competition, Tony considers not entering the competition himself so he can end his run as bake off champion on a high note. Three days before the competition, Tony realizes he’s being absolutely ridiculous and it shouldn’t matter whether he wins a baking competition that normally only has four or five other competitors.

Thus on the day of the competition, Tony is there with his personalized Grateful Bread apron, which is just the Grateful Dead logo with a croissant in the skull instead of a lightning bolt. Copyright infringement? Maybe so, but that apron has seen him through every holiday bake off thus far and it will continue to bring him luck. As he sets up his station, he can’t help watching Thor out of the corner of his eye.

Thor and Loki are setting up their station (or more like Loki is standing around while Thor sets up), Thor looking bright and cheerful and ugh, if he does win again this year he might actually feel bad about it. Thor likely won’t hold it against him, but he just looks so...festive. He’s wearing a Christmas sweater that also has his bakery name and a rainbow on it, for chrissake.

“Hey,” Thor says to him as Tony puts the last of his mixing bowls out on the counter. Tony looks up quickly, surprised to see Thor over here talking to him.

“Good luck today,” Thor adds, holding out his hand, and Tony takes it, giving him a firm shake.

“I should be telling you that,” he replies with a grin. “Good luck taking my title away from me.”

Thor grins back at him. “I’m looking forward to it.”

And for the first time Tony thinks he might actually have some serious competition on his hands.

A different challenge is revealed every year for the bake off, and this year the task is to make a Yule log. The contestants can use any ingredients they have available and decorate however they see fit as long as it keeps with the winter holiday theme.

Tony immediately gets to work on the cake portion, deciding to go with the slightly less traditional chocolate cake. Once that’s baking in the oven he’ll get to work on the espresso-flavored ganache and decorations for the top of the log.

While he works, he can’t help peeking over at the Bifrost Bakery station. Thor is the only one actually baking, since Loki seems to focus on the business aspect of running the shop, but Loki is still hanging around while Thor does the work. Loki catches him looking at one point and gestures for him to keep his eyes on his own station.

Deciding to put Thor out of his mind, he focuses solely on finishing his Yule log. He goes for a completely realistic look, like it’s a real log in the woods on a snowy day, with meringue mushrooms and marzipan pine cones alongside fresh raspberries for a splash of color. When time is up and he steps back from his creation, he nods in satisfaction. There’s no way he’s losing this.

Then he looks over at Thor’s log and his confidence wavers a little. Thor’s gone in a totally different direction, decorating his log with what looks like an entire historic Norse Yuletide scene. There’s even a Yule goat that really looks like it’s made of straw. Tony has no idea how he made all that out of icing and sugar, and within the time limit either.

It’s okay, he reminds himself. Thor’s log may look good, but it has to taste good too. He can still win this.

Then he remembers Thor runs a cake shop and his Yule log probably tastes delicious too.

Shit.

They stand by their stations as the three appointed judges look over everyone’s creations, then taste the actual cakes. The judges write things down on their clipboards and confer amongst themselves, and Tony hadn’t even been this nervous back when there’d been gossip that his restaurant was being considered for a second Michelin star.

Finally, the judges lower their clipboards and get the microphone to announce the runner-up and winner of the competition. A hush settles over the crowd as the main judge congratulates everyone who participated and talks about how this was such a hard decision and blah blah just announce the winner already, Tony thinks.

“So without further ado, the runner up in this year’s competition is...Tony Stark of Grateful Bread.”

There’s applause from the crowd, but Tony barely even hears it. He whips his head around to look at Thor, and even Thor looks stunned. The judge blithely continues on, far too much cheer in her voice as she says,

“And the winner of our twelfth annual winter bake off is our newcomer, Thor Odinson of Bifrost Bakery!”

The cheers and applause get even louder, and Tony wants to wipe that smug look right off Loki’s face. But Thor still looks completely shocked, even as he’s having his hand shaken and handed that year’s trophy (which is just a tiny little thing with a cake on top, but damn did Tony want another one).

Tony applauds with the rest of the crowd, because he’s not an animal, then sighs and starts to clean up his work station. He really thought he had it in the bag again this year.

“Hey,” he hears again, same as before the competition, and he looks up to see Thor standing there with a smile on his face and a slice of his cake on a plate. “I thought we could trade?”

“Oh, uh, sure,” he says, setting down the rag he’d been wiping the counter with and going to find another plate to slice a piece of his cake for Thor. Once they’ve traded, Tony takes a tentative bite of Thor’s cake.

It’s amazing. He hates to say it, but it’s amazing. The cake is the perfect amount of moist and dense without being too thick to be rolled, and God, this cream on the inside too. Maybe he’d gone too fancy with the meringue filling, maybe he should’ve just stuck to basics, then he would’ve had a chance to beat Thor.

“Wow,” Thor says, breaking Tony out of his mental play-by-play. “This is really good! I didn’t know you could do cake this well. The ganache is great, it works really nicely with the meringue. I never would’ve tried something this ambitious in a timed competition.”

“What? No, yours is amazing,” Tony replies, shaking his head. “This is like, the best cake I’ve ever eaten.”

Thor laughs warmly and smiles at him. “Don’t say that, I make cake every day. It’ll be all downhill from here now.”

“I’m sure you’ll somehow find a way to improve,” Tony says, taking another bite of Thor’s cake. “And don’t think this means I’m going to give up. I’ll be beating you next year, mark my words.”

“I’m looking forward to it already,” Thor says, still smiling at him. He doesn’t even hesitate before he reaches out then and rubs a thumb over the corner of Tony’s mouth. “Careful. Icing.”

Tony freezes as soon as Thor touches his face, staring up at him. He’s about three seconds away from saying something really dumb about offering to let Thor clean icing off other parts of him, but thankfully Thor speaks up first and saves him from himself.

“Maybe we could collaborate sometime,” Thor says, looking hopeful. “I think Bifrost Bakery and Grateful Bread could do some really neat stuff together.”

“Neat, yeah.” Tony clears his throat and pushes aside all thoughts of inappropriate icing remarks. If he’s going to be working with Thor now, he’ll have plenty of time to embarrass himself in the future. “That sounds cool, for sure. I could be into that.”

As they stand there talking and eating their cake, beginning their tentative journey to working together, it begins to lightly snow on their strangely perfect holiday scene, and for a few moments Tony doesn’t actually care that he lost this year’s competition.

After all, there’s always next year.


End file.
